charlesbreland.com

realized i never got around to posting anything from the penn state game, so here goes…..

so, jason and brian headed up to tuscaloosa where they met up with kent and patrick (owner of the bama cruiser). they headed up to dc (which i flew into) and picked up me, jeremy, and my buddy jeff there. we then headed northward and into big 10 country.

the floodwaters were high in PA as we came cruising in. here, their random statue of liberty in the middle of a river is almost swamped by the muddy, brown water.

a key feature of the rv is the ability to have a good time while you’re travelling. for us, that involved a 4-some at Augusta National.

when we rolled into state college, beaver stadium welcomed us like a friend. like a friend who was going to be so nice as to let us have free reign of their house. : )

i think we managed to work bacon into every meal. this is me grilling some breakfast

WOW. i totally forgot about that 78/79 sugar bowl game. i really thought penn state had won that one.

prior to the game kent already had his game face on. this is a look that says, i’m gonna appear on the tv broadcast tonight.

here we are just prior to heading in. the tide is ready to roll

the penn state band lines up in significantly more elaborate formations than does their offense.

here we are with the game firmly in hand. jeff had been intrigued by the number of digits on the nittany lion’s hands. apparently different lion schools have different numbers of “pads” on their paws. anyway, every time we heard the lion “roar” we gave the 5 clawed lion salute. abc appreciated it.

jeremy and me after the games’s end

kent and our gracious captain of the ss bama. the baddest rv in the land. drive safely fans!

we had planned to take one more trip to let lil do some water skiing before she got to pregnant, but alas, she didn’t feel comfortable getting out, but at least michael and i got to rip it up. i stopped in foster auditorium (my old gym) which has been COMPLETELY redone. the place was a rathole when we played there, and now it’s super fancy and womens vball and basketball are back to playing there.

lake tuscaloosa was warm and wonderful. here i’m trying to “help” michael, but he obviously isn’t wanting to be “lifesaved” : )

bear loved his first time in the boat, and began to “like” being in the water a little better

michael’s all grown up and ripping big airs now.

and i’m still giving it my best shot, too

michael did have some problems with his tub flipping when jason was dragging us behind the boat, though.

jason won parent of the year for letting michael stay up and play tiger woods golf with us til 1AM on saturday…he also gets big shoutouts for putting up with my little boy (who didn’t get potty training until about 1 week later) who peed on his floor about 8 times : )

it so happened that this year it worked out that neither jeremy nor i would be home for christmas. mine was b/c lillis wants to alternate years, so we’re going with her family to park city for christmas. that’s all fine and well, but my mom had gone 36 straight years with her children home at christmas. so, i decided we would create a new mega-holiday. we would celebrate thanksgiving on thursday, pray that God proved he hated cam newton as much as we did on friday, and then celebrate the first thanksmas on saturday. friday didn’t work out quite like we’d planned, but at least saturday was nice. : )

a few pics from the game are below. thanks again to jason for pulling me seats for 3 of the big games this year….penn state, florida and auburn.

here mcelroy completes a pass. that lets you know that this picture is from the 1st half.

here we have a couple of touchdowns…..obviously also first half.

we left right after that. i’m not sure how the game turned out. i’m going to assume we won.

we put up all the christmas decorations…..

…..and then on saturday morning, the very first thanksmas was born. here mom reads the story from luke about how the pilgrims found jesus laying in a manger

lillis couldn’t have been any more excited if it had been christmas.

the tree looked lovely

i obviously trend towards less excitement than lil

my mom had wanted to get a few shots of the family in for her christmas card, so we squeezed these in just before jeremy and jessica had to take off for the airport.

mama, looks good in the houndstooth, holding the pigskin.

i gotta say, i wasn’t quite ready for christmas yet, but thanksmas was good. i think if had started listening to some christmas music, or just watched elf, or national lampoons a week or two earlier, i’d have been full of thanksmas cheer. all in all, though, i’m pleased with the results.